CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“Never, my child, be concerned in torturing your fellow creatures.”
Private Education: A Practical Plan for the Studies of Young Ladies.
Elizabeth Appleton. 1815.
Afist met gut and Hugh fell to his knees.
Then onto his back.
He stared at the ceiling. It had been newly painted.
“Cadwalader!” a voice boomed. “Where the hell is your concentration this morning?”
Absorbed by rose-blush skin and flaxen hair, nimble fingers, stockinged legs and a soft gasp in his ear as he–
Ice-cold water sluiced his skin and he sat bolt upright, shaking his head like a dog with ear mites. “Damn it! What was that for?”
Seth Hawkins, the owner of this fine boxing establishment on the edge of Piccadilly and with whom he practised every Thursday morn, stretched out a broad hand. “To clear yourhead. Your footwork is sloppy, your fists are slapdash and your concentration is adrift.”
With any other man, Hugh might have disputed such outright fibs, but Seth had once been a champion prizefighter so grudgingly, Hugh grabbed the hand that hauled him to his feet. “I’ll concentrate.”
“No, we’ll stop there,” said Seth. “Your face and guts don’t look as though they’d take another bashing and besides, my next client is here. I’d wager, however…” He lifted the simple hemp rope which surrounded the boxing ring so Hugh could step beneath. “It’s a woman on your mind. Always the same. I’m thinking of changing the name of this place toHawkins’ Advice for Bachelors. Five guineas per enquiry.”
Hugh merely grunted and began unfastening the scant strips of cloth from his knuckles. Seth was one of the few who allowed him to fight more or less bare-fisted because, believe it or not, most criminal lowlifes refused to wait for him to don boxing gloves. He and the retired prizefighter had also discovered they’d become vaguely related when Seth had married a certain Miss Matilda Griffin last year, a distant relation of his own Welsh cousin, but he wasn’t sure that gave Seth cause to bestow unwarranted advice.
Besides, he knew his own mind.
He’d fallen head over heels for Miss Amelia Lambert.
Last night had been…everything. Fervid and intense. Then achingly slow and tender. A shuddering possession that would never lose its allure and–
“I do hope,” an aristocratic voice rumbled, “that your gruesome face was previously marred and not the result of your bout with Hawkins?”
Hugh glanced up to the Duke of Shawdale.
The lofty gent merely wore shirt and breeches yet exuded aristocratic power. His ducal seat lay in the Lake District but hisreputation in London was of a man ruthless in business deals, a miserly shagbag to the last ha’penny and not one to suffer fools gladly.
“Shawdale.” Hugh shook his hand. “Have no fear, Hawkins took pity on me because of my erstwhile bruises, so he’ll pull no punches with you.”
One ducal eyebrow raised. “I would expect nothing less for the coin I pay.”
Hugh rolled his eyes and trailed Seth to a wooden tub of water to slosh his arms and chest. “Seth, for your five guineas an enquiry, tell me what you would gift a lady you hoped to woo?”
The former prizefighter scratched his chin. “I gifted my Matilda tender poetry.”
With dark hair, firm jaw, muscles the size of Hercules and olive-hued skin, it likely wasn’t the only thing he’d gifted Matilda, but Hugh grimaced. He wasn’t so proficient at poetry himself.
“If she requires costly poets and their scribble,” the duke drawled from behind them, “you’ll be beggared soon enough.”
Hugh twisted. “Never gifted a woman anything, Shawdale?”
“Nev–” The duke’s hazel eyes swirled green for an instant before settling to golden brown. “Long ago, perhaps. Before I learned better.”
“Well, any other ideas? Tender poetry’s not my forte.”
Seth slapped him on the back; Hugh nigh drowned in the tub.
